Archita Fritz

Fractional Product Marketing Leader | I help operationalize product roadmaps for commercial success | Strategic Board Advisor | Workplace Culture

I help private equity–backed CEOs and value creation teams turn fragmented go-to-market efforts into a system that drives top-line growth, margin expansion, and commercial readiness for exit.

Most of the companies I support are post-acquisition, sitting around $15M–$50M in ARR, and moving fast toward their growth targets. But behind the scenes? The GTM motion is often still being driven by legacy sales instincts, founder-era marketing, and a whole lot of duct tape.

The symptoms are familiar:
⟶ Sales blaming marketing.
⟶ Marketing running plays that don’t align to revenue.
⟶ No clear ICP, no pricing discipline, and no real GTM narrative investors can buy into.

That’s where I come in.

With 20+ years across global MedTech, SaaS, and industrial technology—leading product launches in 80+ markets—I now partner with portcos as a short-term operator to unblock growth and build real commercial infrastructure.

Here’s how I support the PE lifecycle:

In the first 100 days
→ Run a GTM audit, identify gaps, and prioritize high-ROI quick wins.
→ Bring visibility to what’s actually driving pipeline, not just vanity metrics.

During the build phase
→ Align sales, marketing, and product around one repeatable commercial motion.
→ Fix positioning, pricing, segmentation, and campaign logic.
→ Install weekly operating cadence, dashboards, and conversion discipline.

As you scale
→ Shift from hero selling to system selling.
→ Equip reps with enablement that sticks, and codify what works.
→ Build segment-level GTM plays that actually reduce CAC over time.

Ahead of exit
→ Translate the growth story into buyer-ready clarity.
→ Highlight pipeline velocity, retention drivers, and future upside.
→ Package GTM IP as repeatable, not founder-dependent.

I’ve done this across portcos of AKKR, EQT, Cinven, and Nordic Capital, and across sectors from life sciences to enterprise SaaS.

Outside of portcos, I sit on four boards, keynote international stages, and host the Embracing Only podcast on leadership, identity, and transformation.

If you want marketing to “look busy,” hire an agency. If you want a GTM system that builds enterprise value, call me.

👉🏽 Learn more here: https://calendly.com/archita-e-fm/1-1-work-with-archita-intro-call

What my clients say:

“Archita turned GTM chaos into clarity! And she did it fast!”
— David Hall Rode, CEO, Blue Mountain (AKKR Portco)

“She built our product marketing function and aligned commercial with product.”
— Patrick Hughes, CRO, CluePoints (EQT Portco)

Chief Marketing Officer

We rise by lifting others! Driven by a commitment to build psychologically safe workplaces where people can unapologetically be themselves Archita is resolutely focused to work with partners who want to look beyond metrics to help shape cultures of belonging and cancel out the silent acceptance of bullying and harassment in the workplace.

Archita is the strategy and marketing lead on campaigns, partnerships, products and promotion. If you want to partner with Speak Out on organisational campaigns or partnerships please connect with her.

New client, new year.
First week at Veristat and I got to be onsite for their Commercial Kick Off Meeting! 

Within the first five minutes, I somehow became the Rock, Paper, Scissors Champion! 
(Truly not sure if I peaked there, but it set the tone.)

I love being remote, but a week onsite upfront compresses relationship + context in a way that’s hard to replicate.

A few things I’m taking with me:

👉🏽 Commercial + Operations came together in a real way. You could feel how both sides contribute to the outcome, not in theory, in practice.

👉🏽 They brought in a customer, a family member, and two partners to speak. Hearing from a Veristat team member sharing what it’s like to be a family member navigating finding clinical trials for your loved one, and how that experience changes the way you think about timelines, communication, rigor, and care really struck a nerve. There wasn’t one dry eye in the room with folks recognizing the impact of the work they do.  

👉🏽 The trust Veristat has earned with sponsors is undeniable. There aren’t many teams sponsors rely on to take them from data → direction → regulatory submission with that level of confidence.

Personal bonus: I worked with Andrew (AJ) Mills for a minute many moons ago, so it’s been a joy to reconnect and jump in with his team again.

And I’m genuinely excited to partner with Kim Boericke as CEO, first time I’ve gotten to work this closely with a woman CEO, and you can already feel the clarity she’s bringing.

Grateful for the welcome, Veristat. Let’s go.

Archita Fritz 

Partner to Private Equity CEOs | GTM & Value Creation | Board Member | 2 x Top 100 Product Marketing Leader

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A friend said something to me this week that I can’t stop thinking about.

She met our friend group when we were in our late 20s, because she was marrying one of our friends.

And she told me:

“I remember being genuinely surprised by how many of you were chasing a title like it had a deadline. Like you’d decided, that by this age, I have to be that… or I’ve failed.”

I laughed when she said it, because she was right.

Back then, we used to call it “ambition”, but what it also meant to most of us was “don’t be left behind!”

We were all trying to stay ahead of our insecurity.
 
And what’s wild is… I see the grown-up version of that same chase all the time now.

It is usually not “VP by 30.”

But it’s more like, 

“We need to look further along by the next board meeting.”
“We’ll fix the foundation after we hit the number.”
“Just get through this quarter.”

I get why people say it. I’ve said it too.
Usually it means we’re in scramble mode.

A few years ago, I started asking myself a different question…

𝑨𝒎 𝑰 𝒅𝒐𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒃𝒆𝒄𝒂𝒖𝒔𝒆 𝑰 𝒂𝒄𝒕𝒖𝒂𝒍𝒍𝒚 𝒘𝒂𝒏𝒕 𝒊𝒕…
𝒐𝒓 𝒃𝒆𝒄𝒂𝒖𝒔𝒆 𝑰’𝒎 𝒕𝒓𝒚𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒕𝒐 𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒑 𝒕𝒉𝒂𝒕 “𝑰’𝒎 𝒃𝒆𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒅” 𝒇𝒆𝒆𝒍𝒊𝒏𝒈?

And then, separately, this week I flew in to celebrate a different and very dear friend—mid-week—for her wedding.

I cleared the time properly and showed up without negotiating with myself. We laughed and danced so hard our face and feet hurt.

And for once I wasn’t doing that mental math of what I “should” be doing instead.

And I had this quiet thought on the way home: I’m really glad I don’t live in that frantic chase mode the way I used to.

👉🏽 What was your “by ___” deadline that you have finally loosened the grip on? 

PS: And LinkedIN can you please take a moment to celebrate my gorgeous and dearest friend Sneha on her wedding day!

Archita Fritz at Sneha and Chris Rossi wedding in New York City 

Best thing I’ve done this year so far: breakfast with two women I respect.

Just coffee, tea, some scones were involved and a bit of laughter, with the kind of conversation that puts you back in the right headspace. 

Shea Conboy’s growth over the years has been a joy to watch. 
This past week I got to say it in person.

She was on my team many moons ago, and seeing what she’s built since then is genuinely brilliant. From building social media and event capability from the ground up at various life science companies to starting to build her impact in product marketing, so proud of everything! 

 I left that part of the breakfast feeling properly proud.

And then I finally met Kisha Wynter in person. Author of Your Power Unleashed and a guest on our  Embracing "Only" Podcast  in person for the firs time.  

We talked women in leadership, boardrooms, sponsorship, timing…and every so often we’d stop and laugh: “That’s literally in your book.”

On the way out, I caught myself thinking how often the right conversations get pushed “until things calm down”. 

If you care about women in leadership, your calendar has to show it.

I love catch-ups like this, because In Private Equity land, it’s easy to live in spreadsheets and operating reviews. Breakfast like this pulls you back to what actually moves companies...the people.

Who are you making time for this month?

PS: Check out the link to Kisha's book and her episode in the comments below.

Archita Fritz advisor to Private Equity CEO's and Shea Conboy

Archita Fritz Advisor to Private Equity CEO's and Kisha Wynter author of the book Your Power Unleashed.

These are all the things I would rather do than sit down and do homework with the three littles who live in my home rent free:

✪ Get grilled by a PE sponsor on CAC payback.

✪ Walk into a board meeting with one slide and pure courage.

✪ Explain (again) that “pipeline” isn’t a strategy.

✪ Untangle a CRM that’s 47 versions of “called - no answer.”

✪ Run win/loss calls where the feedback is: “Pricing.”

✪ Rewrite positioning while Legal replaces every verb with “may.”

✪ Align five execs on one ICP without anyone saying “everyone.”

✪ Explain our investor story using chaos, caffeine, and a prayer.

✪ Do a “quick” launch that somehow needs 14 approvals.

——

Because the mental health damage of doing homework and test prep with little humans is something else.

To every parent doing the nightly and weekend sit-down, I see you! 

PS: Anyone else have to take a mid-homework walk outside the house to save themselves from absolutely losing it?

PPS: Picture below courtesy my mid lunch walk last week in the middle of a Sales Kick off meeting! Trying to channel in those calm vibes right now.

Kicking off 2026 with a proud board moment: Inflectiv Group has made a minority investment in psLondon.

Huge congratulations to James Rose, Jan-Philipp Matthewes and the Inflectiv team, and a genuine welcome to Robert Pepper, Tony Speight, and everyone at psLondon. Excited to have you in the Inflectiv collective and for what we’ll build together.

Press release in the comments. 

Proud to share this marks Inflectiv Group’s third strategic addition, building a collaborative network of founder-led independents — now alongside Fresh Air and Hue & Cry | Certified B Corp.  

We’re continuing to grow selectively, making minority equity investments where there’s real alignment on quality, leadership, and culture.  
If you’re a founder exploring that kind of partnership, my DMs are open.

You want to be “easy to work with.”
But a lot of you learn the wrong version of it.

Last week, someone I’d never met got combative over email. This person was several levels senior to me.

All I’d asked for was time on the calendar.

The reply wasn’t neutral, it was defensive and a tone that felt like: “know your place.”

In the past, I would have gone along with it. I  would have been extra polite, over-explained and tried to smooth it over.

I don’t do that anymore.

I stopped the email thread and moved it to a call.
On the call, this is what I said.

“We all want growth and a good way to work together. If that’s true, we’ll be fine. If what you actually want is friction or positioning, then this won’t be a good use of either of our time. Either outcome is okay, I just want it to be clear.”

Once that was said out loud, the defensiveness dropped and the real constraints came out. It turned into a productive discussion instead of a drawn-out thread.

By the end, they suggested spending more time together, not less.

Most people tolerate bad behavior because they want to be easy to work with. 

𝑩𝒖𝒕 𝒃𝒆𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒆𝒂𝒔𝒚 𝒕𝒐 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒌 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝒊𝒔𝒏’𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒔𝒂𝒎𝒆 𝒂𝒔 𝒃𝒆𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒆𝒇𝒇𝒆𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒆.

Going into this week: don’t confuse “easy to work with” with “easy to push around.”
If the tone is off at the start, address it early.

You’ll save yourself weeks of stress, and you’ll get better work out of the relationship.

This week I got to do one of my favorite things: sit across the table from two C-suite leaders I genuinely love thinking with.

David Hall Rode and Amira Modi, thank you for the time, the candor, and the quality of the thinking.

I’m on my way back to Dusseldorf and smiling thinking about how grateful I am for leaders like them in my orbit. 

With David, we can brainstorm in 80 directions in 20 minutes… and somehow it doesn’t turn into chaos, it turns into clarity.

And then there’s Amira, who is the kind of leader who can zoom out to strategy and zoom in to the detail that will make or break execution.

She’s also one of the few women C-suite leaders in healthcare who brings both deep industry credibility and real commercial clarity. I’m lucky to have them both in my orbit.

𝐖𝐡𝐲 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐞?

Because this is what separates teams that move from teams that stall.

Most teams don’t struggle because they lack ideas. They struggle because they can’t turn messy thinking into a clear direction people can execute.

What that looks like:
➟ People keep the real concerns to themselves because it’s not worth the friction
➟ The group talks through ten options and chooses none
➟ Everyone “agrees” in the room, then nothing changes after

What strong leaders do instead:
➟ Make it easy to say the unfinished thing out loud
➟ Keep the pace without steamrolling people
➟ Pull a real decision out of the noise
➟ End with a clear “here’s what we’re doing next”

It sounds very basic, but it really isn’t. And it’s a big reason some companies move faster with the same resources.

I’m grateful for leaders who make clarity feel normal and execution feel possible.

Archita Fractional Marketing Leader for Blue Mountain and other Private Equity Backed Middle Market Portfolio Companies 

This week I caught myself working like something was on fire, even though nothing was.

I’m onboarding a new client, and the engagement is off to a strong start. The work is clear, the team is aligned, and the trust is already there. 

I’ve been doing this independently for nearly three years, so none of this is new.

And yet, more than once this week, I caught myself pushing as if I still needed to earn the right to be here.

It was a strange moment of self-awareness, the kind where you can see your own behavior while it’s happening. I found myself asking a question I didn’t expect to be asking at this stage: 

👉🏾 Why am I going this hard when nothing is actually wrong?

This isn't new work or a new room, and it certainly isn’t about proving competence. By any rational measure, I already belong here.

And yet, something in me still behaves like 𝘣𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘪𝘴 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘭.

That question matters because it doesn’t point to a workload issue. 
It points to an identity issue. 

If you’re doing well in your role or building something that’s finally working, notice what shows up anyway. 

Pay attention to 
the extra effort that isn’t required, 
the urgency that isn’t real, 
the impulse to prove yourself in rooms that have already said yes. 

𝑻𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒓𝒆𝒇𝒍𝒆𝒙 𝒊𝒔 𝒓𝒂𝒓𝒆𝒍𝒚 𝒂𝒃𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝒂𝒎𝒃𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏. 
𝑰𝒕’𝒔 𝒖𝒔𝒖𝒂𝒍𝒍𝒚 𝒂𝒃𝒐𝒖𝒕 𝒃𝒆𝒍𝒐𝒏𝒈𝒊𝒏𝒈.

I don’t have a neat answer yet.
Right now, I’m sitting with the question instead of rushing past it. 

Because something tells me this isn’t about working more or less. It’s about updating who I think I need to be in rooms that have already said yes.

PS: I came across a photo of one of my old teams I had the privilege of leading many moons ago. They were one of the first groups that ever held up a mirror to me around this pattern. Seeing that picture again felt like a quiet reminder I needed more than advice.

We’re in a pilot phase rolling out a suite of AI solutions at a PE-backed company.
And the impatience is… Olympic level.

Week 2:
“Why isn’t the AI delivering value yet?”

Because AI isn’t a vending machine.
You don’t insert “tool” and get “pipeline” back.

In the pilot stage, you’re not “deploying AI.”

You’re validating the conditions that make AI worth using

➟ Data integrity (what we think is true vs what’s actually in the system)
➟ Use case fit (what works in generic SaaS ≠ what works in this industry)
➟ Signal quality (which inputs predict response, and which are noise)
➟ Customer reality (how buyers actually reply, in the wild)
➟ Workflow adoption (if humans don’t use it, it doesn’t exist)

So yes, we should push for outcomes. But if you treat a pilot like a finished product, you don’t speed things up, you just create noise, churn, and “AI doesn’t work” opinions before you’ve even set it up properly.

If you’re a revenue leader in a PE-backed company, here’s the better question than “Why isn’t it working yet?”

“What do we need to make this work reliably, and at scale?”

If you’re in the messy middle of an AI pilot right now, what’s the biggest friction point you are navigating?

👉🏾  data, use cases, adoption, or expectations?

AI is not like a vending machine, you cannot put stuff in and hope to get pipeline out.

In a lot of mid-market PE portfolio companies, the issue isn’t lead generation. 

It’s that the company hasn’t agreed on the rules of the funnel, so leads get handled differently depending on who touches them. 

Marketing passes names,
Sales disputes quality, 
follow-up is inconsistent, 

and the CEO ends up asking for “more pipeline” when the real problem is a messy handoff.

There are other things that matter, and deal velocity is increasingly the bigger constraint I’m seeing, but without a clean handoff you can’t tell what’s working, what’s broken, or what to fix next.

When I’m brought in to steady this quickly, I put a basic GTM system in place in the first two weeks:

➟ 𝑫𝒆𝒇𝒊𝒏𝒆 “𝒒𝒖𝒂𝒍𝒊𝒇𝒊𝒆𝒅” 𝒊𝒏 𝒘𝒓𝒊𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈
One page that Sales and Marketing both agree to. If you can’t say the same sentence, you don’t have a funnel.

➟ 𝑫𝒆𝒇𝒊𝒏𝒆 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒎𝒂𝒌𝒆 𝒍𝒆𝒂𝒅 𝒔𝒄𝒐𝒓𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒖𝒔𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆.
Fit, intent, recency, and engagement, it doesn’t have to be perfect, but consistent enough to run the week on.

➟ 𝑺𝒆𝒕 𝒂𝒏 𝒆𝒏𝒇𝒐𝒓𝒄𝒆𝒂𝒃𝒍𝒆 𝒇𝒐𝒍𝒍𝒐𝒘-𝒖𝒑 𝒓𝒖𝒍𝒆. 
Who responds, how fast, and what happens when it doesn’t happen.

➟  𝑹𝒖𝒏 𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒘𝒆𝒆𝒌𝒍𝒚 𝒓𝒆𝒗𝒊𝒆𝒘 𝒇𝒐𝒄𝒖𝒔𝒆𝒅 𝒐𝒏 𝒘𝒉𝒆𝒓𝒆 𝒍𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒔 𝒅𝒓𝒐𝒑𝒑𝒆𝒅.
Routing, speed, fit, or follow-through, then fix one failure point each week.

This is not complicated. It’s just missing in more companies than anyone wants to admit.

In a recent engagement, this system helped moved leads from roughly 5–10 SQLs a month to 170+ sales-qualified leads in 60 days. 

Not because we “did more marketing,” but because we stopped debating opinions and installed a system the team could run.

If you’re a CEO and this feels familiar, ask one question in your next commercial meeting: what happens in the first 24 hours after a lead is marked sales-qualified? If the answer isn’t clear, start there.

Why Private Equity PE Portcos don’t have a Lead Gen Problem. They have a systems problem. “We don’t have enough leads” is the biggest misplaced diagnosis in private equity portcos

At Christmas, I was lightly chiding my brother-in-law about how much he cares about football. 

Because I genuinely don’t relate. 

I’m not wired to tie my mood to something I can’t control for three hours on a Saturday/Sunday. My brain files it under: “entertaining… but not emotionally binding.” 

Also, I know basically nothing about American football. 

My strongest credential is still that I once stood on the inside of a football field because I was crowned University Homecoming Queen in 2004. That’s the whole resume!

Fast forward to Saturday, Jan 17. 
The Buffalo Bills lost 33–30 to the Denver Broncos.

My BIL and his entire family are huge Buffalo Bills fans. 
Like it affects the entire "household mood" fans.

So you can imagine, the family chat lit up immediately.

 And it wasn’t just analysis. It turned into people fast:
“He’s such a good guy.”
“He does so much with kids.”
“He deserves a ring.”

Bills fans… I’m sorry. 
That one looked painful.

---
And it made me think about something I see in Private Equity-backed leadership teams after a miss:

𝘐𝘯 𝘗𝘌, 𝘢 𝘮𝘪𝘴𝘴 𝘰𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘯 𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘯𝘴 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘭𝘢𝘮𝘦 𝘧𝘢𝘴𝘵.

The room starts hunting for the person attached to the number. Usually it is because we want the chaos to make sense, so we pin the story to a person.

In sports, it can swing either way just as fast:
one moment, one person… 
and suddenly it’s either pile-on or protective loyalty.

A few things I’ve seen the best PE teams do instead:

➜ Separate “bad outcome” from “bad decision.” 
Sometimes the call was right and the timing just didn’t cooperate. 
Sometimes you got lucky and you shouldn’t repeat it.

➜ Force specificity. 
Not “we need to execute.”
More like: “3 deals slipped 30 days” or 
“churn ticked up in X segment.”

➜ Make the next step small and real. 
One fix, one owner, one date, before the next LT/board call.

➜ Do a quick ‘what changed’ review. 
What we thought, what happened, what we’re changing. 
No courtroom or character trial.

Pinning it on one person is the quickest way to feel like you’ve explained it. It’s rarely the quickest way to improve it.

PS: Serious question...are you a “watch with people” fan or a “do not speak to me during the game” fan?

Picture credit: AP Photo/Jack Dempsey

Good products don't sell themselves.
At least, they don't do it twice.

Most companies find their first "big win" through sheer grit and a great product. But when they try to launch the second or third product, the wheels usually start to wobble.

If your revenue is plateauing despite a great roadmap, the gap is likely in your Product Marketing foundation. Transitioning from a single-product company to a multi-product powerhouse requires a specific shift in "muscle memory." 

👉🏾 You have to move from selling a tool to selling a solution universe.

I helped a team navigate this exact pivot. 

They had the talent and the tech, but their growth was capped by their position. By building a repeatable "pre-commercialisation" engine, they unlocked a 40% revenue lift across their entire portfolio.

1️⃣ Defining the Operating Model: 
↳ Moving away from ad-hoc launches toward repeatable playbooks.

2️⃣ Pre-commercialisation is more than just feedback: 
↳It’s about doing the heavy lifting, market sizing, competitor mapping, and message testing, long before the sales team ever sees the product. If you haven't validated that a "gap in the market" is actually a "market in the gap," you’re just setting your reps up to fail.

3️⃣ Internal Readiness: 
↳ Ensuring Sales knows not only what the product is, but also where it fits in the broader universe.

I’ve attached the one-pager we used to guide this process. If your team is struggling to move beyond your first "big win," I hope this roadmap helps you find some clarity this week.

Roadmap to take your company from a single product to a multi product universe. How to scale your company from a single product to a multi product solution. How Product Marketing can help you grow your product roadmap. How to commercialize your product roadmap.

I work at the core of DFX/Upper Echelon’s operating system - designing the environment, standards, and processes that allow trust to hold and aligned relationships to scale.

The future of private capital will belong to networks that can maintain coherence as the world accelerates. That requires more than investment strategy. It requires clarity of communication, alignment of behavior, and environments where the right people can find each other without noise. My work is making that infrastructure real, repeatable, and consistent across every interaction in the network.

At Upper Echelon, I steward the operational architecture of the Inner Circle and the Founder AI Lab.
I ensure that founders entering the ecosystem develop strategic clarity and communicative precision.
I maintain the relational standards that protect trust among investors and capital partners. And I develop the next generation of operators through our Fellowship - preparing them to navigate complexity with judgment, not just efficiency.

The network works because it is curated, structured, and upheld with discipline. Trust does not emerge by accident - it is built, reinforced, and protected. That is my focus. I believe the next era of private capital will not be defined by who has access, but by who has alignment - and who has the operational capacity to maintain it under pressure. My work is ensuring Upper Echelon remains the place where that alignment is possible.

If you value clarity, trust, and long-term collaboration, we should talk.

Ella Cook

I walked into Davos without fully knowing what I was stepping into.

WEF was well outside my comfort zone. That’s where real growth lives.

Coming from Australia, I still have moments where I pause and take it in. Doors I never imagined are now open because I chose to step forward, not wait for permission.

Davos is intense. Overwhelming the first time, if I’m honest. I was fortunate to have Jonathan there to help navigate the pace, the rooms, and the conversations that matter.

Walking the Promenade, you see country houses and some of the world’s largest companies converging in one small Swiss town. Dozens of cultures, perspectives, and power dynamics in a few short blocks. No Australia House, but plenty of opportunity to represent anyway.

Being surrounded by that level of global thinking sharpens you. It expands how you see the world and yourself.

It fuels my drive to keep building. 

We’ve just launched DFX 2.0, a new private capital ecosystem. uedfx.com

This is only the beginning.

Alexis Morgan Archita Fritz Arian Khamooshian Jonathan Nowak Delgado Katrina Salazar Ole Richard Korsan Stuwe Romain Afflelou Katalin Gallyas Melissa Barall, CFA, FDN-P Katrina Victoria Gumaya Aditya Khurjekar Manfred Tropper Jojo Sofekun

Ella Molony Cook

3x Founder. 1X. Co-founder & CCO at DFX | Upper Echelon - Intelligent Operating System for private capital. Building the Inner Circle to educate the next-gen to build & allocate capital with trust, impact, and longevity.

𝗡𝗼𝘁 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀, 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗶𝗻𝘀𝗶𝗱𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱.

At DFX, we don’t just invest.
We incubate companies end-to-end.

That proximity gives us a clear, unfiltered view into where private capital actually breaks as deal volume scales:
• fragmented deal flow
• outdated IC processes
• slow, manual documentation
• investor relations held together by email threads
• platforms never designed for how capital actually moves

Managing private capital has never been harder.
And the infrastructure hasn’t kept up.

That’s why founders building at the edge of Fintech, AI, and Longevity - like Steve Iskander, Darshita Gillies, Frances Zelazny , Nicole Casperson, Jacob Varghese, and Alaa Amer - don’t just need capital.
They need infrastructure that can keep up with how fast ideas move.

So we didn’t add another tool to the stack.
We built the foundation.

An operating system for private capital - designed for founders, funds, and next-generation capital allocators who value speed, clarity, and control.

If you’re building in Fintech, AI, Longevity, or the Future of Work and want to pitch your deal free, you can do that here 👉 https://uedfx.com

The future of investing won’t be managed.
𝗜𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗯𝗲 𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗱.

Funds building inside the ecosystem:

𝗙𝘂𝗻𝗱 𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲: C2 Ventures
◾Chris Cunningham - Founder & Managing Partner
◾Matt Olivo - Co-Founder & Managing Partner
◾Jamie Redington  - VC Analyst
◾𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗴𝗲: Early Stage VC, Seed
◾𝗦𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀: B2B, energy, financial services, information technology, materials & resources
◾𝗛𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘀: USA 

𝗙𝘂𝗻𝗱 𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲: Blue Tulip Ventures
◾Rana el Kaliouby, Ph.D. & Gabi Zijderveld - Co-founders
◾𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗴𝗲: Early-Stage 
◾𝗦𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀: human-centric AI, applied to health, wellness, productivity, learning, sustainability. 
◾𝗛𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘀: Founders based in Boston, USA

𝗙𝘂𝗻𝗱 𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲: BBG Ventures
◾Susan Lyne and Nisha Dua- Co-founders and Managing Partners: 
◾Claire Biernacki - Partner
◾Carol Magalhães Isaacs, CFA- Senior Associate
◾Addison B. Marsh, Jr. - VP Finance & Operations 
◾𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗴𝗲: Pre-Seed / Seed 
◾𝗦𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀: consumer internet, mobile, healthcare transformation, fintech, education/work, climate, vertical AI, e-commerce, fashion, beauty. 
◾𝗛𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘀: New York City, USA

𝗙𝘂𝗻𝗱 𝗻𝗮𝗺𝗲: Kli Capital
◾Shmuel Gniwisch, Founder & Managing Partner 
◾Elias Davis, Partner 
◾𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗴𝗲: Pre-Seed/Seed, Series A
◾𝗦𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘀: fintech, healthtech, insurtech, CPS, enterprise software, AI
◾𝗛𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗾𝘂𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘀: New York, USA

Over the weekend, I spent time with a European family office, and it reaffirmed exactly why I am building this ecosystem and why Europe holds something the rest of the world is quietly searching for.

The future of capital will not be shaped the way the past was. The next generation of principals and founders see the world differently. They care about impact, stewardship, and responsibility as a function of legacy, not as a trend.

What stood out most was the vulnerability of vision that was shared. A willingness to confront harder questions about what truly matters, and how capital can be used to create long term, meaningful change.

I am deeply honoured to be godmother to the youngest member of this family, and to support his emerging fashion venture - one built with a genuine impact mandate. Fashion was where my career began, and this moment feels like a return to my roots.

This is exactly why we have just launched DFX (uedfx.com). An ecosystem designed to support next-generation founders, operators, and capital with the right infrastructure, values, and long-term thinking. 

If we want a sustainable future, we must create safe spaces for Gen Z and Gen Alpha to learn, fail, build, and be supported.

Europe understands something fundamental: quality of life, depth of relationships, and presence matter. As AI accelerates how we work and live, this truth becomes more critical - not less.

People talk about being a founder like it’s a job title.
It’s not.

It’s a responsibility you choose to carry.

Yes, you’re building a company and a brand.
But the part people don’t talk about is that you’re also building your confidence and identity.

And asking yourself questions most people avoid:

Why this?
Why me?
Why now?

Early on, it feels uncomfortable.

There is no “traditional” path to becoming a founder.
You will never have all the answers.
You’re learning in public while people are watching.

Kevin Jurovich said it best:

Airbnb didn’t start with travel insiders.
Uber didn’t come from transportation lifers.
SpaceX wasn’t founded by career space engineers.
WhatsApp didn’t begin with messaging executives.
Dropbox wasn’t started by cloud veterans.
Tesla didn’t come from legacy auto leadership.
Netflix wasn’t built by traditional media insiders.
Spanx wasn’t started by someone from fashion.
Hubble didn’t begin with marketplace experts.
DFX didn’t start as the operating system for private capital.

What those founders shared wasn’t certainty.

It was closeness to a problem and the willingness to take ownership of trying to solve it.

Most companies are started by people willing to step into uncertainty before things feel clear.

They’re shaped and strengthened later by others who help refine and scale.

So if you’re hesitating because you don’t feel fully “ready,” remember this:

None of them were.

Join our private capital playground for entrepreneurs, sponsors, and deal makers building what’s next - together.

After an incredible week at one of the most elite conferences in the world, WEF, I’m reminded how powerful it is to step outside your usual environment. New rooms, new conversations, new perspectives.

My version of therapy after days like that is snowboarding. A reset. Space to think, breathe, and let the ideas land.

Next stop: Zurich 🇨🇭
Really looking forward to finally meeting a leader at DFX Abegail, I’ve been working with for over 18 months in person. When you build with a global team, those moments matter. There’s something different about sitting down together after building side by side across time zones.

We’ve also just launched our new platform, uedfx.com

Join free and become part of a premier private network built for founders, operators, and investors building globally.

#privatecapital #davos #wef #switzerland

This month I invested in Anthropic, we’ve building incredible technology through Claude.

Previously been allocating across early-stage, real estate, digital assets, and reviewing a number of “boring” businesses to acquire.

We’re about to release something world-changing for this. Upper Echelon  

#Investing #PrivateCapital #Anthropic #AI #EarlyStage #Secondaries

Curious, what are you focused on investing in right now?

The author can see how you vote. Learn more

Standing in the room at Invest Qatar, I was reminded that progress doesn’t come from louder voices.
It comes from braver leadership.

On stage were women shaping diplomacy, capital flows, policy, and global trust - not as a statement, but as a reality.

What struck me most wasn’t that they were women.

It was how few there still are.

Despite overwhelming data showing that women leaders and founders:
• Build more capital-efficient businesses
• Deliver stronger long-term returns
• Lead with higher trust and resilience

Less than 𝟯% 𝗼𝗳 𝗴𝗹𝗼𝗯𝗮𝗹 𝗩𝗖 𝗰𝗮𝗽𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹 still goes to women founders.

Only a 𝗳𝗿𝗮𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗼𝗳 𝗱𝗲𝗰𝗶𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻-𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗰𝗮𝗽𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹 is deployed by women.

This is not a values issue.
It’s a 𝗰𝗮𝗽𝗶𝘁𝗮𝗹 𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗼𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗳𝗳𝗶𝗰𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝘆.

If we truly care about economic resilience, innovation, and global stability, then capital must move toward outcomes - not old patterns.

Watching leaders like H.E Dr. Hend Bin hendi alaleeli, Cherie Blair CBE KC, Noor Talib Al-Malki, and Shaila Manyam reinforced something I deeply believe:

Capital should flow to those building trust, solving real problems, and thinking long-term - regardless of gender.

The data just happens to show women are doing this exceptionally well.

The opportunity ahead isn’t about “supporting women.”

It’s about 𝘂𝗻𝗹𝗼𝗰𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝗹𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗱 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽.

Conversations like this at Invest Qatar matter - because the future isn’t built by talk.
It’s built by who we choose to back.

And the numbers are clear.
Now the capital needs to catch up.

Tagging inspiring investors already moving the needle:
• Female Founders Fund - exclusively backing female-founded companies
• SoGal Ventures - global female-led VC for diverse entrepreneurs
• Halogen Ventures - consumer tech with women in founding teams
• BBG Ventures - early-stage consumer with female founders
• Rethink Impact, LP - tech solutions led by female and non-binary leaders

Let’s connect and deploy smarter capital together.

#InvestQatar #WomenInLeadership #CapitalAllocation #InvestInOutcomes #GlobalLeadership #TrustEconomy #GenderLensInvesting

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